Gothitelle has been selected as a suspect for Stage 7. The primary reason for this is to isolate the discussion from the rest of the megathread so that it's easier for everyone to make a decision when the time comes (because, let's be honest, the time will come). Everyone who plays the tier is welcome to participate in the discussion and express their opinion pertaining to whether or not they believe Gothitelle is ban-worthy. All UU Senate members are expected to be actively involved in the discussion.

While this is a debate and you are trying to convince the people voting that Gothitelle is / isn't ban-worthy, please do remain civil and have respect for everyone else. I will not hesitate to edit / delete / infract posts that are rude or insulting to other members. I will also not hesitate to delete / infract inane or flat-out stupid posts, either (ie. "Gothitelle has only been in the tier for a day! How could it possibly be broken???"). Also, this should go without saying, but it's happened in the past, so... please refrain from posting if you don't actually play UU. Thanks.

Due to the nature of this suspect and the fact it hasn't actually been in the tier for that long, this debate is expected to last anywhere from 2-4 weeks, after which the Senate will convene and vote on the matter. The resulting paragraphs will then be posted in this thread and the verdict will be carried out.

With this newly acquired addition to the underused tier, there's been a lot of mixed feelings. Some say that Shadow Tag Gothitelle is broken, others say it isn't. I believe that it isn't broken for a few simple reasons.

The first being is that god-awful Speed stat. At base 65, Gothitelle is not outspeeding much without a Choice Scarf, and only tops out at 376 Speed. This leaves it outsped by basically every other Choice Scarf user, every Pokemon capable of boosting its Speed, Weavile and Crobat. Two Pokemon that immediately come to mind in this range of Pokemon are Weavile and Scarf Krookodile (hey, this thing might be useful again), as both outspeed and heavily threaten Gothitelle with STAB Pursuit, Crunch, or Night Slash. Other Pokemon that serve as checks to it include Darmanitan, Scarf Heracross, and Sableye. There's too much in the tier that can outspeed and beat Shadow Tag Gothitelle for it to be remotely broken.

Next comes its average-ish Defence and HP stats. This allows for powerful and fast setup or choice users to beat Gothitelle down. Choice Band Flygon and Scarf Darmanitan are prime examples, as both crush Gothitelle with Outrage and Flare Blitz respectively. This also allows for Dark-types such as Sharpedo, Honchkrow, and Weavile to beat up on Gothitelle. Had it a more defensive typing or better physical bulk, I would understand the claim to Gothitelle being broken, but with such capability to be smashed by a strong physical attack, it isn't that big of a deal.

Third, its typing and lack of viable recovery. Psychic typing is just bad in general, especially for something that's intended for trapping. The big thing here is, it's weak to U-Turn, a fairly common move in the underused tier, and one of the best tactics for getting free of Shadow Tag. Another downside is that Gothitelle has to rely on Rest, Wish support, or a Tricked Leftovers to regain lost HP, heavily reducing its staying power as a trapper. This also leaves Gothitelle extensively vulnerable to hazards and status, reducing its staying power even further.

Another key issue with Gothitelle is that Sableye is a hard counter. Specs Gothitelle only manages a paltry 2HKO (like 55% on average) with a single coverage move (Thunderbolt), and thanks to Recover, Sableye doesn't fear them, and can just PP stall the new trapper. Taunt will also render Trick useless, forcing Gothitelle to switch or become strugglebait, dying to a combination of Will-O-Wisp and either Night Shade or Foul Play. If not running Psyshock, Gothitelle is absolutely shut down by the likes of Snorlax and Porygon2. It's simply not powerful enough to deal with the two titans without Psyshock and loses out to both (Crunch or Body Slam from Snorlax and Tri-Attack / BoltBeam from Porygon2).

In conclusion, I feel that having the 13 Pokemon slower than Gothitelle run the option of Shed Shell (Scrafty, Sableye, Azumarill, and Snorlax all beat it anyways) and the inclusion of a new trapper only adds to the brilliant metagame in underused, giving us access to a new revenge killer not worthy of a ban.

This thread is here because Shadow Tag is a big deal, and our community deserves to know that we're giving it due weight. The creation of the thread doesn't mean any of us are even remotely considering banning the thing at this point, but it does mean we will be giving Gothgirl more scrutiny than, say, Mienshao or Scrafty. As mentioned in the OP, there will be around a month of playtesting before we come to a decision. Until then, this thread should be used for talking about Gothitelle. Not about how we can't know anything about its tiering status, because while we don't, that doesn't mean a sufficiently major addition to the UU metagame shouldn't be auto-suspected if deemed appropriate by a majority of the tiering leads (Koko made this thread only after consulting me, upstart, pkgaming, reach, and jabba).

Okay, I should have probably made this clearer in the OP, but you're not really supposed to have an opinion of whether Gothitelle is broken or nor just yet (Pokemazer -_-)--it's only been in the tier for a day for fuck's sake; how could you possibly know if it's ban-worthy yet?

Gothitelle has been selected as a suspect for Stage 7. The primary reason for this is to isolate the discussion from the rest of the megathread so that it's easier for everyone to make a decision when the time comes (because, let's be honest, the time will come).

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Like FlareBlitz said, we decided to open this thread because Shadow Tag is a big enough deal that Gothitelle's discussion deserves to be isolated from the megathread; not because we have decided to ban it. In fact, from pure theorymon, I'm leaning towards 'not broken' due to the metagame being too offensive for it to keep up with. I hope I've made myself clear, and if I haven't, too bad, suck it up. Posts questioning the early opening of this thread will be deleted and infracted, as I have already explained our reasoning. Now feel free to argue your little hearts out.

Leaving the posts that responded to the dumb posts because they explain why this is open. This is a big deal. Goth is banned from grand slam for this round. The discussion should be isolated and given special care. If you don't have a reasonable opinion on it yet because it's too soon then fucking wait 2 weeks before posting an opinion on whether or not to ban it. Until then just treat this like a normal discussion topic on the pokemon.

While Pokemazter is completely right about offense beating Gothitelle, I believe that he missed a key point as to why Gothitelle is so threatening. Shadow Tag Gothitelle means that Stall is virtually impossible now in UU (or any lower tier for that matter). I am going to touch base on the two moves which makes Gothitelle so deadly in my opinion, Trick and Tickle.

We all know how Trick works, switching items is always an annoyance, especially for any stall team. However, most well built Stall Teams usually have Trick Fodder, which means that they are able to play around a majority of Trick Users. However, the difference with Gothitelle is that you literally can hand pick what Pokemon you want to cripple with Trick, and unless your opponent is running Shed Shell, they have absolutely nothing they can do about it. And while you can say "ok, so more Pokemon run Shed Shell, no big deal", there are some Pokemon (Gliscor, Qwilfish, Snorlax, etc) who all really need Leftovers to function, and they cannot afford to run Shed Shell or they lose out on a significant portion of their walling capabilities.

Trick also works on teams that want to eliminate Rapid Spinners. A Spike Stacking offensive team with Gothitelle can literally defeat every common Rapid Spinner in UU. Hitmontop loses to Psychic, Blastoise loses to Thunderbolt, and Claydol loses to ShadowBall. Hitmontop has Sucker Punch, but you can just spam Trick until the PP runs out, forcing them to lock onto a move that you can abuse.

Trick also doesn't mean you can cripple Stall, it can cripple every single type of play style. Tricking things like Iron Ball on set up sweepers that are forced to stay in, or things like that make it so frustrating for the opponent, and unless they make EVERY single one of their Pokemon able to beat Gothitelle, then something on their team is guaranteed to be screwed.

Now there's Tickle. Simple concept enough, Tickle + Pursuit. Pokemon locked in on a poor move choice (Scarfed Heracross on Close Combat) easily gets sent down to -4 to -6 and gets demolished by Pursuit. We've seen this combination with Wobbufett, and we all know how good it was, so I am not going to dive into this more.

Gothitelle also has other moves that can beat other Pokemon. While Tickle beats Physical attackers, it also has access to Mirror Coat, meaning any choiced Special Attacker that can't OHKO Gothitelle (it has good bulk) is going to die.

I could go on, but I think these are valid enough points as to why I think Gothitelle deserves to be banned

The single reason that makes Gothithelle so dangerous (and a suspect) is being a Shadow Tag user that can act offensively. Some of the arguments that have been brought up are ''it's too slow'' or ''it's defenses are just average''. It doesn't really matter, since Gothithelle is fast enough to outspeed what it needs to -basically, walls like Gligar, Qwilfish Rhyperior, Slowbro or Snorlax, which Gothithelle can either outright kill (or Trick / weaken with Psyshock in the case of Snorlax), meaning pokemon like Mienshao, Heracross, Raikou or Choice Scarf Darmanitan have a much easier plowing through teams, as a simple U-turn or a double switch to Gothithelle is enough to get their counters out of the way. While Gothithelle can only kill 1-2 mons maximum per match (which would be an argument against its ban), that's almost always the only help some strong sweepers need to be able to sweep. Of course, Gothithelle is usually much worse against offensive teams, but it has the defenses to at least revenge kill 1 pokemon of its choice, something that can be crucial in the course of a match since offensive teams usually rely on Choice Scarf users to deal with some threats. I'm not totally convinced that Gothithelle is broken, but I think its going to be a bad influence on the metagame.

To say that stall is useless is absurd, you simply have to adapt to tier changes. You can't expect to use the same team for too long and expect to be successful. Using goth I can say without a doubt she's a fantastic pokemon, she's probably the reason HO might make a comeback in uu. TBH bulky offense is one of the most bland playstyles there is and goth is doing an excellent job in allowing more diversity to come through. What I've found is, given the right set/move she can effectively 2HKO every bulky water in the tier(excluding milotic). Most hazard setters and EVERY spinner fall to her. The game has become less spike/hazard stacking and more strategy. In essence, goth's presence is removing the reliance on entry hazards to win a match(which I really like). She ain't lacking flaws though. First off, she's set up bait for every single dark type in the tier. Scrafty being the most notable(and dangerous). Like everyone here mentioned, she has shitty stats so that's not helping her. She does trap walls/spinners easily, but a simple solution would be carrying a phasing move or u-turn/volt switch, which most walls have access to. If you can't do that, paralyze her or predict a goth switch in and switch out to a pursuit user. She's only been out for a day, so I think people just need time to adjust to her. Afterwords, I believe she'll be a welcomed addition to the tier.

To be honest I don't think SubCM Gothithelle is worth using, as it's far the worst set in the metagame, since it gets beaten by the walls it should be trapping (and killing), either via Roar, hitting it hard (in case of stuff like say, Snorlax or Rhyperior) or just statusing Gothithelle. The most dangerous set is by far the Choice Specs one, as it can take most walls in 1-2 hits and cripple others with Trick. Choice Scarf has also it's utility since it can take out pokemon like Gligar that invest on speed or Offensive Roserade, as well as being able to stop some offensive pokemon, too.

I've been playing around with the Goth tower a bit now, and she seems really good, top tier for sure, but I don't think broken (coming from the guy that thinks nothing is). She functions really well with U-turners. For example, I paired her with a scarfed Darm. Once Slowbro/Blastoise are out of the way, nothing can stop him, and with Grass Knot on Goth, that's easy enough to accomplish. I use the Specs set, the only one worth using.

I think that what Godsend said is really important. One of the best cleaners and physical attackers in UU, Darmanitan, becomes almost unfair with Gothitelle support. What are the pokes that usually check / counter Darmanitan? Chandelure, Blastoise, Milotic, Slowbro, Suicune, Rhyperior, Gligar, Arcanine, Azumarill, Houndoom, Kingdra, Snorlax, Swampert, Victini and faster scarfers that can ko him, meaning Scarf Flygon, Scarf Mienshao and Scarf Raikou. Now almost all of those pokes can killed by U-turning to Specs Gothitelle except for Flygon, Chandelure, Houndoom, Kingdra and Victini. And the best things is that all the pokes that Gothitelle cannot trap and kill can be 1-2hkoed by the aproppriate coverage move. So this fact right here shows how dominating the Scarf Darmanitan + Specs Gothitelle combo is going to be, and even potentiall broken.

I know it's too soon, and pardon me if what i say is horribly wrong, as i haven't really playtested this combo, but at least in theory it seems hard as fuck to play against... What are your thoughts?

Goth has difficulty with half the checks you listed. It depends on each set it can use. Besides that, max spdef milotic can't even be 2HKO'd by specs grass knot. Goth can't OHKO victini, while victini has v-create. Same with houndoom, goth only 2HKO's with specs t-bolt while houndoom can seriously damage it with dark pulse/sucker punch. Goth needs thunderbolt for azumarill, which means swampert walls it. Ryhperior can only be taken out by GK which limits goth's coverage. In theory she seems destructive, but in practice a good player knows how to get around it. Let me remind you 95 base offense is average in uu. It won't be revenging anything unless it has specs, if it does it gets outsped by most things.

...so everything except from those pokes gets trapped from Gothitelle. Btw physically defensive Milotic always gets 2hkoed by Grass Knot, and specially defensive Milotic always gets 2hkoed by Psyshock, so Milotic always loses. Oh and you can run both Tbolt and Grass Knot to deal with any water type, if your purpose is to eliminate Darmanitan's checks and counters. The moveset i am talking about is Psyshock / GK / Tbolt / HP Ice. This set can kill everything that counters/checks Darmanitan, except from the mons i listed. And Gothitelle has enough speed to elimnate another pokes check/counters (such as Darmanitans), making it almost impossible for you to wall/check said threat.

It's not like SpD Milotic walls Darmanitan very well in the first place...

But honestly, Gothitelle is really not as brainless as people are making it out to be. Now, I'm not saying a well played Gothitelle isn't absolutely destructive, but so is a well played Mienshao / Chandelure / Kingdra / Raikou / Roserade / whatever. The problem--imo--lies with how insanely difficult it is to play around Shadow Tag without decreasing the quality of play in the tier as a whole (i.e. running fucking Shed Shell on everything).

The insanely offensive nature of the tier at the moment makes it hard for me to call Gothitelle "broken" in the traditional sense. But one thing I can say for certain--it distorts the tier a hell of a lot. Is it a good distortion? I doubt it, but I can't say for sure. However, if I determine it is indeed a change for the worse, I'll probably vote to ban it when the time comes.

You could always run pursuit users to handle goth, uu has a ton of them...
Krookodile, heracross, snorlax, honchkrow, Bisharp, ect. Playing around goth is tricky, but like every new threat, you have to develop a way to prepare for it.
Btw most goth only run 3 attacks, with trick being in the fourth slot. So it can't really take on every bulky water type.
Adaptation is needed to become successful. However, if it comes to the point were shed shell
has to be run on things like slowbro, then I think that may be a bit too much...

You could always run pursuit users to handle goth, uu has a ton of them...
Krookodile, heracross, snorlax, honchkrow, Bisharp, ect. Playing around goth is tricky, but like every new threat, you have to develop a way to prepare for it.
Btw most goth only run 3 attacks, with trick being in the fourth slot. So it can't really take on every bulky water type.
Adaptation is needed to become successful. However, if it comes to the point were shed shell
has to be run on things like slowbro, then I think that may be a bit too much...

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You still failed to adress my point, which is that Gothitelle's support may prove to be too much for UU, and to show this i picked Darmanitan.

Pursuit users are irrelevant in our discussion, because you are going to kill Gothitelle AFTER she kills your Darm check/counter. And why does it matter what most Goth run? If the most effective way of making Darmanitan sweep is to run 4 attacks Goth, then why not do it?

I just tried the darm+goth combo. Let me say it isn't THAT great. I played 6 games(I know that's not much, but it's enough to give me an idea). First off, goth has trouble taking most neutral attacks. It's susceptible to all forms of entry hazards, and as I mentioned before is pursuit weak. Most of darms checks/counters you mentioned can be run on the same team together. On top of that, most teams usually have a good dedicated scarfer and are ready to deal with goth. 5 games out of 6 I won(the one I didn't had crazy hax against me). But that's only due to the rest of the team pitching in. The reason you want to run trick is to neuter most walls that goth can't touch(I.E. umbreon, stalllax). Do I think its support ability, is great? Of course it is, slap ST onto anything and it will be. Is it overpowered? Time will tell, IMO. From what I saw, most teams are ready to deal with it.

Visual Media Head

You still failed to adress my point, which is that Gothitelle's support may prove to be too much for UU, and to show this i picked Darmanitan.

Pursuit users are irrelevant in our discussion, because you are going to kill Gothitelle AFTER she kills your Darm check/counter. And why does it matter what most Goth run? If the most effective way of making Darmanitan sweep is to run 4 attacks Goth, then why not do it?

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IMO the best way to counter Darm in the first place is to check it with offense. Very few things can switch into it, period. Priority, Scarf 100+, Rocks + recoil, the fact that Darm can hardly switch into anything. All of those factors can come together to check Darm.

Honestly I really like Goth as a mon, and what it brings to the table. As koko said, its really not brainless, and I enjoy playing with it. Here's why I don't think it's broken: your opponent can play around it as well. The way I've been playing Goth, and how I imagine others have as well, is I use it to destroy a wall that is prohibiting one of my sweepers from sweeping. However, a smart player doesn't throw his or her vital check/counter around in any match (and while your opponent has to avoid using a counter, you have to avoid using Goth or risk losing her, so the footing isn't too uneven). Luring and defeating counters is not a new concept, and while Goth might make it a lot easier, the point is that just because a sweeper has a partner that can rid it of counters on paper, it isn't broken. Raikou can use Rotom-H to get rid of its counters pretty easily on paper, and while double electric is a great strategy, it wasn't broken. Another thing is Goth is generally one for one, it takes out one wall and thats about it.

All in all, I'm trying not to underhype Goth because she is really good and very useful, I just don't think she's detrimental over all to the metagame.

I just tried the darm+goth combo. Let me say it isn't THAT great. I played 6 games(I know that's not much, but it's enough to give me an idea). First off, goth has trouble taking most neutral attacks. It's susceptible to all forms of entry hazards, and as I mentioned before is pursuit weak. Most of darms checks/counters you mentioned can be run on the same team together. On top of that, most teams usually have a good dedicated scarfer and are ready to deal with goth. 5 games out of 6 I won(the one I didn't had crazy hax against me). But that's only due to the rest of the team pitching in. The reason you want to run trick is to neuter most walls that goth can't touch(I.E. umbreon, stalllax). Do I think its support ability, is great? Of course it is, slap ST onto anything and it will be. Is it overpowered? Time will tell, IMO. From what I saw, most teams are ready to deal with it.

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That's not what alexwolf was saying. He is not using Gothitelle as a sweeper, he is using it to remove Darmanitan's counters. You send in Darmanitan, lure its counters, U-Turn out and get a free switch-in to Gothitelle, trap the counter and OHKO/2HKO it, making Darmanitan a huge trouble for the opponent. Once the true Darmanitan counter is removed, Darmanitan is way more useful than Gothitelle, so that's hot a huge deal since you have the sweep almost guaranteed.

Just want to say that if Goth can cherry pick a specific Pokemon on the opposing team and kill it without question no matter what, it has already supported its team more than 95% of the tier could ever hope to support... and unless you're running 6 Pokemon that have nothing to fear from psyshock / grass knot / hp ice / shadow ball (a pretty difficult feat), it's GOING to get that 1 cherry picked kill.

Visual Media Head

Just want to say that if Goth can cherry pick a specific Pokemon on the opposing team and kill it without question no matter what, it has already supported its team more than 95% of the tier could ever hope to support... and unless you're running 6 Pokemon that have nothing to fear from psyshock / grass knot / hp ice / shadow ball (a pretty difficult feat), it's GOING to get that 1 cherry picked kill.

and getting a chance to kill two? That's just gravy.

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No Trick? Goth is still super slow, even with scarf, and boasts a mediocre 95 base sp atk. Furthermore, getting Goth in on anything with decent attacking stats without sacking your own Pokemon is a challenge, and your opponent can always be careful with crucial teammates. Goth is really good, no doubt, but it's not quite "Oh lol I can auto-kill anyone on your team" like you're making it out to be.

No Trick? Goth is still super slow, even with scarf, and boasts a mediocre 95 base sp atk. Furthermore, getting Goth in on anything with decent attacking stats without sacking your own Pokemon is a challenge, and your opponent can always be careful with crucial teammates. Goth is really good, no doubt, but it's not quite "Oh lol I can auto-kill anyone on your team" like you're making it out to be.

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You just pointed out on an earlier post why she is efficient at one of her best jobs with namely dealing with walls. Because of their nature she does not have to care too much about her speed or possible incoming attacks from them putting that much of a dent on her. Now with regard to her 95 SpA it is mediocre but this is why SPECS helps her to do her job better at brute forcing these walls or defensive pivots. And with the coverage she has available to her as pointed out by LonlyNess she does do her job quite well at covering common walls or defensive pivot typings.

I would actually argue I find Goth's switch in opportunity to be rather reasonable given precisely the increasing offensive nature of the metagame there are threats which more often than not pressure me into the defensive with ease, Heracross for instance is one mon you do not want to net a kill for obvious reasons so I will more often than not switch to Qwilfish. Yes, you can play around her to a degree with very well timed double switches but same could be said for Goth trappers. In fact it is their advantage in this situation given that the defensive pivots or walls that Goth aims to take down are more often than not dealing with more than just one threat so they will switch in rather often giving trappers more chances to increase their probability catching the mon.

Visual Media Head

You just pointed out on an earlier post why she is efficient at one of her best jobs with namely dealing with walls. Because of their nature she does not have to care too much about her speed or possible incoming attacks from them putting that much of a dent on her. Now with regard to her 95 SpA it is mediocre but this is why SPECS helps her to do her job better at brute forcing these walls or defensive pivots. And with the coverage she has available to her as pointed out by LonlyNess she does do her job quite well at covering common walls or defensive pivot typings.

I would actually argue I find Goth's switch in opportunity to be rather reasonable given precisely the increasing offensive nature of the metagame there are threats which more often than not pressure me into the defensive, Heracross for instance is one mon you do not want to net a kill for obvious reasons so I will more often than not switch to Qwilfish. Yes, you can play around her to a degree with very well timed double switches but same could be said for Goth trappers. In fact it is their advantage in this situation given that the defensive pivots or walls that Goth aims to take down are more often than not dealing with more than just one threat so they will switch in rather often giving trappers more chances to increase their probability catching the mon.

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Yes, Goth destroys walls. I felt like LN was suggesting that any team member was up for grabs though, not just walls, and thats just exaggerating. And while it may destroy walls, I feel like defensive pivot implies some manner of offense, like Shaymin or Swampert, who both deal over 50% to 252 HP Goth with Seed Flare and Earthquake. Yes, I know Goth outspeeds and OHKOs with Grass Knot, the point is that Goth can't just meander it's way into any match up and auto ko any Pokemon it feels. Walls suffer, yes. But UU doesn't rely as much on walls as it does offense, I really don't see everything changing that much.

And as another note, Qwilfish is a meh switch into Heraboss in the first place, because even Jolly -1 EQ 2HKOs without hazards, including leftovers, 100% of the time. Heracross might not be able to sweep locked into EQ, but it's not like Qwilfish is a complete Hera-lock down.

Yes, Goth destroys walls. I felt like LN was suggesting that any team member was up for grabs though, not just walls, and thats just exaggerating. And while it may destroy walls, I feel like defensive pivot implies some manner of offense, like Shaymin or Swampert, who both deal over 50% to 252 HP Goth with Seed Flare and Earthquake. Yes, I know Goth outspeeds and OHKOs with Grass Knot, the point is that Goth can't just meander it's way into any match up and auto ko any Pokemon it feels. Walls suffer, yes. But UU doesn't rely as much on walls as it does offense, I really don't see everything changing that much.

And as another note, Qwilfish is a meh switch into Heraboss in the first place, because even Jolly -1 EQ 2HKOs without hazards, including leftovers, 100% of the time. Heracross might not be able to sweep locked into EQ, but it's not like Qwilfish is a complete Hera-lock down.

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Not sure what Qwilfish variant you're fighting but if its a defensive variant with 252 HP and defensively EVd (I go with 200 EVs) with positive nature your roll would generally be 39-46% factor in lefties and that becomes significantly lower... Its hardly a 2 OHKO and from there you can either switch out or wreak havoc by setting more hazards or crippling Heracross XD.

You're right Goth cannot switch in that freely to defensive pivots if it were the SPECS variant - I'm not at that much of a liberty to say if it is popular or not - assuming of course they are faster than her (but given that Goth is better capitalizing off slower mons I generally stick to those pivots). But trick scarf variants are more defensively built to choice lock their target without much fear, meaning its the better way to screw over faster mons. Either way she is set she gets her job done with ease, neutering or eliminating walls or pivots. That opens the way for her team mates to do their business in peace.

Visual Media Head

Not sure what Qwilfish variant you're fighting but if its a defensive variant with 252 HP and defensively EVd (I go with 200 EVs) with positive nature your roll would generally be 39-46% factor in lefties and that becomes significantly lower... Its hardly a 2 OHKO and from there you can either switch out or wreak havoc by setting more hazards or crippling Heracross XD.

You're right Goth cannot switch in that freely to defensive pivots if it were the SPECS variant - I'm not at that much of a liberty to say if it is popular or not - assuming of course they are faster than her (but given that Goth is better capitalizing off slower mons I generally stick to those pivots). But trick scarf variants are more defensively built to choice lock their target without much fear, meaning its the better way to screw over faster mons. Either way she is set she gets her job done with ease, neutering or eliminating walls or pivots. That opens the way for her team mates to do their business in peace.

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Whoops I was assuming more speed. Well Scarf has its own problems as well. I don't know the standard either, I'm using Scarf now built to outspeed + nature 95s so I can retain Modest power and some bulk investment, and it's still (obviously) kind of slow. The sheer power is missing as well, as well as a coverage spot used for trick. I'm not saying Goth isn't effective, I'm not saying it isn't dangerous, just not unfair. It can do a lot, but not all of it at once. I'm using Honchkrow on the same team, and imo it's a scarier trapper with Moxie Pursuit and a sweeping opportunity. It's hard to survive a 80 STAB from krow, and that goes for Sucker Punch and Pursuit.

Yes, Goth destroys walls. I felt like LN was suggesting that any team member was up for grabs though, not just walls, and thats just exaggerating. And while it may destroy walls, I feel like defensive pivot implies some manner of offense, like Shaymin or Swampert, who both deal over 50% to 252 HP Goth with Seed Flare and Earthquake. Yes, I know Goth outspeeds and OHKOs with Grass Knot, the point is that Goth can't just meander it's way into any match up and auto ko any Pokemon it feels. Walls suffer, yes. But UU doesn't rely as much on walls as it does offense, I really don't see everything changing that much. .

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Gothithelle might be slow but it has a respectable speed when factoring on Choice Scarf (376) so it's not limited to ''take down walls'' as it can trap some offensive pokemon too, even if it's not as reliable trapping them as to it is trapping walls, but sometimes just removing a key offensive pokemon (such as a Choice Scarf user like Flygon) can be extremely important on a battle.

Some of the guys above made some good points about why Gothitelle + Darma is not a broken combo, such as that many teams carry multiple checks / counters for Darma, and Gothitelle will be usually be able to kill only one of them, and that priority really hurts Darma. In the other hand Gothitelle can also trap most priority users, but at this point, she may find it difficult to do so many tasks in one game so i don't know.

The fact that i didn't manage to test the combo except for a few shitty games that i played, doesn't help, so i will try to come later, with more experience.

Visual Media Head

I rescind all defense of Gothitelle. Using Hera + Goth + Darm and the result is ridiculous. Goth easily opens up Darm to smashing everything, and Hera to Moxie sweeping. It really provides crazy team support.

Is Shadow Tag possibly being banned or Gothitelle possibly being banned or is it too soon to contemplate any sort of ban? I just see no point in stripping UU, RU, and NU of a Pokemon, even if it is almost useless when it is clearly not broken (nobody thinks Frisk Gothitelle is broken right?) It would also help deal with Chandelure if Shadow Tag gets released so we wouldn't have to deal with Chandelure. All we lose is Wynaut which is pretty much never used even in never used.